I've met plenty of people with really kooky ideas. Unfortunately, as I've grown older, I've noticed that I've held some odd-ball ideas too. I've had my fair share of standing on the metaphorical picket line, waving a banner of some half-baked idea like a half-baked college kid protesting some evil or restriction of freedom.
My Hair Was Curlier Back Then
Where was I? Got lost in my metaphor there.
Ah yes.
If I'm learning anything since those early days of promoting ideas it is this: Caution/Moderation. I have come to see how fallible I am, and despite still being incredibly passionate, I find I check myself more than I used to. I'm more cautious about how I present my ideas. I'm a little more humble.
A little.
I still have a long way to go. A long way.
Two posts today got me thinking about this. First, Dana Hanley at Principled Discovery has a very thought provoking post about homeschool convention culture. And then Andrea of True Moments of Family has a post about emotionalism in Christianity. Both of these posts deal with a kind of "group think" or "group culture" that can lead to potentially damaging ideas.
Perhaps that's what the cheerful people at Despair, Inc. were thinking about when they developed their Meetings poster.
And so, in a group or not, we should carefully consider the things we say and the ideas we support. We must use reason when we make decisions and claims. On the other hand, if we swing too far toward reason, we may end up like Niki in iRobot: With a completely logical, but very destructive idea.
Thus, as I think about Christianity and homeschooling, I hope to approach the topics with enough reason so as not to be driven by emotion, but enough emotion to not be overrun by reason. And maybe that's what it means to have a level head: To be in balance. Not in a Zen kind of way, but in the sense that I'm not flopped too far to one side or another.
~Luke Holzmann
Filmmaker, Writer, Expectant Father
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